Mario Merlino

Mario Merlino (2 June 1944-) was an Italian anarchist who was charged, and later acquitted, with the 1969 Piazza Fontana bombing.

Biography
Mario Merlino was born in Rome, Lazio, Italy in 1944, and he joined the Italian Social Movement in 1962. He later defected to the National Vanguard, and took part in the 1968 student demonstrations, but, following a trip to fascist Greece (ruled by the Regime of the Colonels), he was alienated from neo-fascism and became an anarchist. He joined Pietro Valpreda's "Bakunin Club" in Rome, and some accused him of being a fascist infiltrator. In 1972, he was arrested for his alleged role in the 1969 Piazza Fontana bombing, which was initially believed to have been an anarchist attack, but later proven to be a neo-fascist "false flag" operation. In 1979, he was sentenced to four years in prison for subversive associations, and his conviction was confirmed in 1981. He was acquitted in 1987, and he became a teacher.